Hold On
by Enchanted Hats
Summary: One-shot. AAML. When the Cerulean Pokemon Gym is attacked by Team Rocket, Ash throws himself into danger once again to save his best friend. But before he can reach her, Ash's luck runs out. Now, navigating the world as a ghost, Ash has to rescue Misty before she joins him.


Hold On

 **Disclaimers:** You should know by now that I don't even yet own my own stories let alone pokemon.

 **AN:/** This one-shot is for the contest winner missmybcmiyuki. Her request was that I write her doujinshi, Hold On, that she entered into my contest out to be a fiction oneshot piece. So this is for her.

Hopefully you won't mind too much if the dialogue isn't exact. I tend to embellish. Especially in dialogue.

* * *

Even if the sky does fall  
Even if they take it all  
There's no pain that I won't go through  
Even if I have to die for you  
-Starset

 **H** er hair was still the same fiery red even through the badly creased and sun bleached kodachrome photograph Ash kept in his jacket pocket. It was a few years old now. New on the last day he saw her. Old by badly loved photographs standards. But Ash wouldn't accept a new photo until he saw her again with his own eyes. That was his goal.

In the few years of his absence, Misty had taken a very active and vocal role as Kanto's Cerulean City Gym Leader. Though still very young, her sisters' sudden relinquishing of the gym into her hands had long since been expected. Even by Ash, who had seen how the sisters carelessly ran their gym- and was dreading the day when they'd want Misty back.

Misty took on her new position with both confidence and grace. And when the recent Rocket attacks had reached violent and then deadly levels, Misty had expressed great disgust. She addressed the general public of Cerulean City, at then only 15 years old, with talk of putting down the rising terror, even if they, the people of the water, had to do so alone.

She had always been braver than him. At least, Ash thought so. He might have gotten them into tons of reckless situations but she was the one to always bail them out. And to call out the entire force of Team Rocket on national television, well, that took a whole other set of steel balls. It was something to admire really.

Ash had seen her speech on TV. Though he hadn't wanted to watch- wanting to see how she changed in person. But Ash was drawn by her familiar voice. By the confidence and demand that she expected of her listeners.

Her hair was still red. But she had less color to her face than before- where months upon months of walking in sunny weather had caused her skin to tarnish. Her hair was longer, or it just appeared longer because it wasn't in her side ponytail. But her eyes were the same. Her face still the same face. Her smile... still the same smile.

He should have known then.

He should have known when watching her through the tiny bits of colored static that made up her image...

He should have known that she was in trouble.

But he had no idea.

That's why when upon walking to the Cerulean Gym, the explosion took him completely off guard.

It ripped through the streets like a misfired cannon. At the sound, Ash and many others, instinctively hit the concrete. He covered his face with his arms, feeling the shrapnel of expelled glass cut into his skin.

The roar of the explosion gave way to a different more panicked shrill. That of both pokemon and human alike. Ash peeked through his arms at the chaos around him. People bleeding, screaming and running. Pokemon, blinded by the explosion, some even on fire- trying to put themselves out.

A young woman was crying- yelping her shrill cries for help while dragging a unconscious and badly burned man away from the flames. Perhaps a husband or sibling. Clearly someone of importance to the woman with the way she clung to him.

Ash almost went to her. But upon climbing to his knees, Ash could see where the explosion had come from. He hesitated. Only for a moment while he wondered how it could have happened. Who would want to hurt the Cerulean sisters? Until he realized that the question was stupid. It didn't matter who. Only that that it had happened. And now someone would have to do something.

Ash dashed off in the direction of the gym. The woman who had been dragging the man, stopped to stare as he passed. She reached out a hand as if to stop him but didn't. And when he vaulted himself through the shattered window, he could hear her shouts start up again behind him.

He could see nothing inside. The smoke stung at his eyes and burned down his throat. All he could see was a gray swirling mass enveloping and swallowing him. It swirled around and erased his own hands from his body. He walked- stumbling over nearly everything possible on the floor. And Ash could only hope that he wouldn't stumble his way into one of the pools.

Ash remembered too late that smoke rose and that he should be crawling to avoid it. He also realized too late that opening his mouth to shout someone's name would not help him breathe.

There was another explosion that knocked him to the floor and the hat off his head. Ash let it go, knowing that there'd be no use rescuing it when he couldn't even find Misty.

"Misty!" Ash coughed. "Misty, are you here? Misty!"

There wasn't any answer. Not even from her sisters, whom he had hoped would be screaming. Misty wouldn't scream for help. She was too tough. Unless something really bad had happened to her.

Ash stumbled once more. This time, he hadn't the strength to return from his knees. The room spun. Even from the floor, his own hands were only a silhouette, slipping from floor to wall to ceiling in his dancing vision.

He heard another crash from above his head. A different sound from before. It sounded like bones being wrenched out of place.

He looked up and was struck in the head.

Ash collapsed on his side. The board that had fallen had splintered. And now he could feel that it had also sunk deep, penetrating into his side. Pinned to floor, Ash could make out Sedra and Horsea designs on the tiles, swimming in the ribbons of his blood. They seemed to come to life as his life ebbed, spinning off the floor- floating up into the ocean of smoky air- the polluted ocean stroking their red stained bodies.

And then...

And then he wasn't sure what had happened. It was like waking from a dream. Except it felt more like he was waking into a dream. It was euphoric- floating above on the smoky air where the Seadra and Horsey had once cut paths.

He could hear things outside himself as he drifted higher and higher. The sounds of screaming and the roar of flames that blend into a kind of soft hum of background noise. Like the buzz of an open fridge.

Something kept piercing through the sound. It was a name. It was his name. And yet, it was hard for him to claim it. The sound was like a puff of air. When he tried to catch it, it squeezed through his fingers and moved on. Its shadow rose higher than he had been, so he rose with it. Grasping at a name that he had wanted and hadn't wanted and yet was his all alone.

And then suddenly, Ash opened his eyes.

"Where am I?"

He could see the city beneath him, bathed in the evening's twilight. In fact, he could see the city beneath him- through his own legs.

Ash did a complete and soon regretted 180. The movement sent his senses reeling. Uncontained by the physics ordained upon humans, the sensation of both being and not being was not a welcome one.

He waited, gripping his hair (or what he supposed was his own mental likeness of what it was like to still have hair), for the world to take a moment and fill him in. The last time he was like this, his pikachu had been along for the ride. And his pikachu might have been along for this ride too, if Pikachu hadn't of expelled so much of his strength in training- that he ended up carelessly breaking a leg.

Although Ash had felt bad for his pikachu when sending him to Professor Oak, now he wished he had been the one with the broken leg. Because now it seemed he had broken a lot more than just legs.

Ash suspected that he was no longer for this world.

He held up his hand, watching the streetlights come on through his fingertips.

"I guess I didn't make it," said Ash humorlessly.

 _But what about Misty. What had happened to her?_

As a ghost, he wouldn't be bound by walls or people. He could come and go as he pleased. And if she had been saved, Cerulean's Metropolitan Hospital would be the place to check for her. That is, of course, as soon as he started going...

Ash rocked himself to and fro in the air, trying to remember what it had been like to fly at ten years old. He flung his arms forward and tried to dive into the air but ended up more dog paddling than flying.

Shouldn't it have been easy? He remembered it being a lot more effortless.

And as soon as that thought came to mind, Ash plummeted ten stories.

For a moment, Ash forgot that he couldn't die twice. He screamed. And then, upon his realization, he stopped all together. He hung eagle spread in mid air- breathing heavily though he didn't quite know how, lacking a physical body as he was.

 _That was actually a lot scarier than my death._

Ash somehow managed to upright himself. And in doing so, changed his halt into a slow free fall. His toes were nearly an inch off the ground when opted for movement of the horizontal variety.

Giving up on the swimming strokes that he had applied before, Ash willed himself forward. The speed in which he moved was near instantaneous. He was halfway across town with just a thought. Except that he had no idea where to start.

Ash surveyed the fairly unfamiliar surroundings before shooting himself back to the gym. The remains of what used to be Misty's home, stuck out of the ground like the ribs of a gutted carcass. The flames had long since died. It was empty aside from soot and debris. And in the mess of the skeletal remains, Ash supposed laid what was left of his body.

"I always knew I'd die in a fire," said Ash with morbid amusement.

 _Focus Ash. Hospital remember? We have to find the hospital._ Ash reminded himself. _Hopefully she'll be there... and not the morgue. Agh, don't think that way! Hospital, hospital!_

He closed his eyes and centered his thoughts on the image of a hospital. The stark white walls and the sharp smell of rubbing alcohol permeating through the corridors. He tried to hear the gurneys wheeling noisily through the halls. And the sounds of nurses, doctors and relatives alike shouting and crying for people to hold on, feel better, stay with us, come back...

There was a rush pressing against his body. Ash opened his eyes just in time for a gurney to be wheeled by. It passed directly in front of him, just in time for Ash to catch a glimpse of a face underneath the clear oxygen mask.

 _Was that..._

Ash followed the gurney and the paramedics wheeling it as they rushed down the halls. The paramedics' voices were a whirl of noise, none of which he could piece together. Numbers, figures, chances of survival, causes, heart rate. Ash couldn't be sure, as he had only ever looked down from this perspective once before, but he thought that was himself on the gurney. Ash was much paler than when the chandelier had hit him that time before. And he was bleeding heavily from a wound in his stomach. They were pressing a compress over the gaping wound but it was seeping blood at such a alarming rate. Surely he should run out of blood soon.

But he was alive... sort of. Ash was breathing, abet with a little assistance. So was he in some sort of coma, like before at the haunted tower? One that only re-entering the body he was expelled from, could cure? Ash wasn't sure how these sort of things worked. Especially since last time, his ghost escapades were heavily influenced by the presence of ghost pokemon.

This time, he had no such influence. He was outside of his body because his body couldn't contain him anymore. And Ash figured that was because he was dying.

The paramedics were in such a rush to get Ash into surgery that on the way into the large hospital elevator- a paramedic carrying his IV bag nearly ran over one of two other nurses walking along the hall.

The brunette jumped out of the way just in time, nearly knocking over the other nurse in the process. A tray of recently cleaned instruments went clattering to the floor.

Ash was just about to follow his body into the elevator when the words of the nurse pulled him away.

"Not another one."

Ash paused. And with that pause, the elevator doors closed in his face. It was weird, having no reflection in the glassy surface. It was as if his reflection had been on that gurney, carried far away from him.

His only chance of returning to normal went up several floors. But he couldn't search for Misty strapped to a gurney. If he went back to his body now, he'd be in no fit state to help anyone.

"I can't believe it," said the nurse who had dropped the tray. She bent down, carefully plucking up the sharp tools by their grainy handles. "So many hurt... It was like the apocalypse out there."

"They were after the gym leader. The bastards."

"And they got her, didn't they?"

Ash felt as though someone has seized him by the throat. _They got her?_ He had hoped, furtively, that she hadn't been in the building. That perhaps she had been called away.

The women, having successfully cleaned up the scattered mess of scalpels, retractors and other such tools, had started walking away. Their conversation easily drifted in to cheerier chat. Shift changes. Kids and their schools. Husbands.

But Ash wanted more. They couldn't just leave him with that. He couldn't even stomach the mere suggestion that she... that she had suffered. That he had failed to save her. That in getting trapped, he had failed her- and caused her death. That he might have been feet away- mere feet, but faltered too soon, didn't shout loud enough or went the wrong way.

No. She _had_ to be alright. Ash couldn't live with himself, or whatever spiritual plane of existence he now endured, knowing that Misty had been lost.

Ash attempted to catch one of the retreating women by the shoulder. "What about Mis-" He started, faltering when his hand slipped through and then out of her body again. Mystified, Ash pulled back his hand. "Wait..."

The words he had been trying to say got caught up inside his throat. Numb realization washed over him as the two nurses walked away.

 _It's no use. They don't even know I'm here._

The hospital was huge. If he took the time to search every room, it might be too late.

And her body wasn't what he needed to find. He needed to find her wandering spirit- provided she was stuck in the same out of body experience he was.

Though he couldn't even be sure of that.

His brief flirting experience with the astral plane hadn't left him an expert. How ghost pokemon could pull souls out of human bodies, what form ghost pokemon had before they died, and what frame of spiritual existence he now lived were all unanswered questions. He only assumed that, like before, returning Misty to her body might undo what had been done.

With no clear destination in mind, Ash decided that, for starters, he would just have to skim the city skyline. From that height, he might be able to spot wherever Misty's spirit might be wandering.

But as Ash went to phase through the hospital walls as before, a white hot pain seared to life deep in his chest. For a moment, the wall was material. He slid down it, clutching at his chest and dry retching in pain. He knelt, forehead pressed against the floor. The tiles felt cool to his fevered face. He concentrated on the chill, in a vain attempt to tame the fire combusting inside him.

The pain flared once again. His body wrenched in response. Ash went to catch himself from hitting his head against the floor. But his hands sunk through the floor.

He was immaterial again.

"What," Ash gasped. "What the hell was that?"

Ash sat up, still suspended in midair by his lack of presence. His vision swam before his eyes, throwing the corridor into a weird kaleidoscope sense of proportions. But focus was returning- first in the center of his vision and then thinly spreading itself out.

 _Maybe I'm dying,_ Ash thought. _More so than this._

He had appeared pretty far gone when his body was wheeled into the elevator. But they hadn't exactly zipped him up in a body bag yet. Maybe this state of being was only temporary. Maybe it wouldn't be this way much longer.

 _In that case, I need to find Misty. And fast._

Ash pushed himself off the floor and through several more floors of the hospital. He leveled off his ascent at the roof, scanning Cerulean City below him again. _Where could she be? Where_ would _she be?_

Ash considered the gym again, the site sticking out like a smoldering zit on the skyline. _But,_ Ash considered. _If I thought I were dead... would I really wanna hang around the place that I died?_

He turned, facing the looming mountains that appeared painted into the young night sky. _Mount Moon is slightly east of Cerulean City. But Bill's lighthouse..._ _And the nearest shoreline..._ Ash looked north expectantly. The closest body of water was north to Misty's own hometown. If her house were destroyed, then surely, she would have headed to the place that offered her comfort.

Ash fished into his jacket for the old badly worn picture of Misty. He was mildly surprised that he had been able to find it. The translucent presence of the photo had still stuck with him. She was smiling in the photo, and Ash realized that she probably wasn't smiling right now. He focused on the image, and closed his eyes- filling her into the air in front of him. When he opened his eyes, the scenery had changed.

Instead of the many blaring lights, signs of Cerulean City's nightlife waking, there was a rocky and harsh cliff face. The waves were frothy as they spilled over the beach. There was a driving and powerful force of nature unfolding itself beneath him. And Ash was glad that he hovered several feet away from its clutches.

 _And Misty?_

Ash glanced up, almost surprised to see the red head there. It seemed the vain hope that she wasn't a ghost was still wrapped around his heart strings.

She had her knees pressed hard into her chest, clutching onto them as if letting go would cause her to fall into the rocky depths below. Her eyes were clouded and unseeing. Her hair, lacking in its usual vivid color, framed her face in sweaty stringy strands. And Misty's whole body trembled to a chill that Ash was sure she could not feel.

"Misty..." Ash breathed, taken aback by her crippled appearance.

She didn't answer. Instead she began to rock. As she rocked, she started chanting- softly. So softly that Ash couldn't catch the words, as they drowned in the crash of the waves beneath them. Ash drifted closer. And as he did, a chill began to ice up his arms. As if he was slowly submerging himself into sub-zero waters.

It was hard to shake of the cold. As the numbness swept up into his body he began to remember everything wrong he had ever done in his life. Everyone he had ever said goodbye to. Every mistake.

His loss at the Indigo League. Charizard's evolution. Feeling like he had to give up pikachu. Being stuck in the sinking innards of the SS. Anne. Watching Butterfree fly off. Losing his friends to Sabrina. Saying goodbye to his best friends on the path back to Pallet Town.

It started to feel like he hadn't done a single thing right in his life. In fact, he couldn't bring himself to remember anything he had done right. He felt lost. The deepening and hallowing numbness was eating him from the inside out. But when his eyes settled upon Misty, flutters of happy memories came back. He remembered that he caught his first pokemon by her side... and how it made her squirm. She hated Caterpie so much. _Misty..._

Ash quickly realized that he needed to focus on her. When he looked at her, the cold didn't seem nearly as unbearable. He knew he needed to save her.

He could hear her now. Frozen tears speckled her cheeks as she whispered, "It's all my fault. It's all my fault."

"Misty?"

"...my fault."

Ash grasped Misty by her shoulders, lifting her up. She was limp in his arms and her skin felt like ice. He touched her face, hoping to coax her eyes into meeting his own.

The iciness was lacing up his legs again. If he couldn't reach her...

"Misty... Please wake up."

She blinked and slowly lifted her gaze. For a long moment she said nothing, and then her eyes seemed to regain their focus.

"Oh," She whispered. The icy air lifted suddenly, as if it were only anchored by Misty herself. Ash felt himself shudder as it passed, and Misty blinked again.

"Ash... No. You're dead too?"

Despite her horrified expression, Ash couldn't help but smile. Color was returning to her face now. He stroked her cheek tenderly. "No. I'm not. Not yet. And neither are you."

Misty blinked, tears welling in her eyes again. "Ash... Ash I... I'm sorry I wish I hadn't made that announcement. And now... And now you and my sisters..."

Ash shook his head. "Hey now. None of that. Everything's going to be alright. I promise."

Misty took his hand from her face and clasped it in both her own. "Ash _please_! Please don't make promises you can't keep!"

He grabbed both of her hands and pulled them close, positioning them over his heart. Startled, Misty looked between her hands and Ash's face. But sure enough, underneath Misty's nonmaterial fingertips, she felt the faintest flutter of a heartbeat.

"I'm not going to let us die, Misty," Ash smiled warmly. And Misty found herself blushing.

* * *

 **B** efore she could fully recover, Ash was already driving themselves back full speed to Cerulean City. Though they were moving quickly, Misty could feel no pressure of wind against her body. And though they were flying, she could hear Ash's words clearly, "We need to get back to our unconscious bodies. That's our only chance."

As soon as they were over the city, Ash lowered their descent quickly. Misty felt as though the lights from the buildings and cars were spinning all around her as they dropped. A dull ache was beginning in her legs. And though she had no chance to tell Ash this, he seemed to already know. He quickened their pace, the city now passing by in streaks of light. In little to no time, they had passed through the solid walls of the metropolitan hospital. They had only just made it into the lobby when Ash fell against the opposite wall.

He was heaving and clutching at his chest. Misty stood over him in concern, gently bracing his back. He covered his mouth and raised himself back up, ignoring Misty's stare.

"Ash, what's wrong?"

"It's nothing," Ash said hastily, lowering his hand. "Really. I'm fine. Just dizzy."

He smiled but Misty only smiled weakly in return. _He's fading._

Ash started down the hall pulling Misty along behind him. He rushed them through several rooms, without so much as a second glance at those laying in the hospital beds. Ash jumped them up floors and traveled down the halls again, all the while tugging Misty along.

 _If we don't find ourselves... then what?_

Misty didn't want to think about it. But as Ash continued to lead her into room after room of dead ends and as Misty began to feel weaker and weaker, the cold helpless feeling began creeping up inside her again. She didn't want to die. There were so many things left to do. The gym needed her now. Cerulean City would need her now.

Ash would need her now.

Ash was still looking ahead, still searching when Misty had begun to lose hope. Though he wasn't looking her way Misty could tell that he was still in pain. It was in the tightness in his shoulders, the stiffness in his walk.

The numbness was spreading up to Misty's midsection now. So was she further along? Or was he?

Misty tightened her grip on Ash's hand. _We'll both live through this. Both of us. Together._

But once they had slipped into the next room, Ash had buckled again. He fell forward onto his knees nearly throwing Misty overtop of him.

"Ash!" Misty gasped. He was bent over, hugging his chest. She touched his shoulder and he shuddered in pain.

"Ash... Ash," Misty said trying to lift him back to his feet. "Ash, you're not alright."

"I'm fine," He said at length. He looked back up at her and managed a half hearted grin. "Just some indigestion. Must have been something I ate."

"I'm serious, Ash."

"So am I," retorted Ash with mock abashment.

"You need to get back into your body-" Misty paused. She had grabbed Ash's wrist- intent upon dragging Ash to search another room. When she noticed the person laying upon the bed.

His body was laced with burns and his midsection had been heavily bandaged. But he was there- tied up in many tubes and wires. Ash's body was still alive, intact, and breathing.

Two nurses stood in attendance over him and three other patients, but none of which were Misty.

But he was there. And _alive_!

"Ash," Misty said, tugging urgently on his arm. "Your body. You can go back now."

But Ash wasn't listening. He was on the floor again.

Misty grabbed at his torso, planning to heft him over to his body. But even if he hadn't the strength to stand, he still had enough to push her off of him.

"Ash! You need to go back."

"No," said Ash with certain difficulty. "You need to get back first."

"You're out of time!"

"But I can still feel pain."

He looked up at her. And with his stare, Misty realized why he had been in such a hurry. Why he kept trying to push himself so hard. Misty looked down at her own form, startled to find that the lower half of her body had disappeared. Her fingertips were fading now, shimmering away like broken glass.

Ash let off a deep sigh at the same time of his physical body. Misty looked frantically to his heart monitor that had slipped into a flat line. The nurses and doctor at his bedstead leapt to his aid- desperately attempting to restart his pulse.

"Ash!"

Ghost Ash was at her side, the pain no longer crippling him as it had before. He took her by the hand and quickly pulled out of the room where chaos had erupted. All the medical staff at hand trying to save his life. And he was walking away. Disputing all their efforts.

Misty ripped herself free from his grip.

"Go back!" She screamed.

Ash looked back, startled by her sudden anger. She hated to hurt him. And she didn't want to demand from him something that she herself wasn't willing to give. But there was no time left. None at all. And if either of them was going to be saved, Ash was the only one who had time left.

How long had she been fading? How long had she flat lined?

Was there any body to return to?

Misty realized she was crying. She went to wipe away her face, shocked to still feel the sensation of touch to her face, despite that the fade had spread halfway up her arms now.

"You can't save us both. And you can't save me," said Misty. "So please. Go back. Return to your body and live for me. Live for both of us."

"Don't say that, Misty! Don't give..." Ash faltered, taken aback by the sight of his own hands disappearing before his eyes.

Misty shook her head and smiled, "You don't have much time left. Please, go back."

Ash snatched at air, trying to find handhold to Misty's remaining form. But she was slipping faster and faster, fading away from him.

"I'm not letting you go!" He shouted.

He said more. But it seemed that sound had slipped out of her ears. She could see his lips move. His face was creased with concern, and she could tell he was shouting for her. Trying to bring her back.

And then, Misty found herself falling. She fell backwards, away from Ash and the corridor and through the floor. Falling until she couldn't tell what she was falling through anymore. Just a blur and a sense of vertigo swinging her through the air.

Her descent was slowing now, into a kind of gently drift. Like a waft of a feather. If this was dying, it didn't seem so bad. It was sort of like falling asleep. Almost easier than falling sleep. Like leaning back into a deep velvety soft bed and letting her eyelids drop.

She could hear Ash's shouts now, trying to catch her. They were far off but growing near. _So he didn't listen._ She felt a little sad at this. But then, perhaps, she wouldn't have to be alone.

But it wasn't Ash's voice. It was deeper. A different voice. Many different voices. She fell into the wash of voices, disoriented by their rapidly increasing volume.

She could feel something hard catch her in its arms. She clenched her hands around soft sheets. The soft hums and trill of machines rocked Misty back to her senses. And Misty realized all at once that she was alive and breathing.

But still she couldn't bring herself to open her eyes. Instead Misty squeezed her eyes shut tighter- trying to hold back tears.

Ash had saved her. Which meant... that he...

The image of Ash's final exhale of breath had unwillingly painted itself on her closed eyelids. Letting go of his life in order to save hers. It was too much for Misty to face at the moment.

She could only hope that she was mistaken. That she had dreamed up Ash's ghost. Maybe she had dreamed up the whole incident at the gym too. Maybe she was just sleeping in her own bed at home.

But there were bandages wrapped around her fingers. Her whole body throbbed with a soft pain. No matter how tightly she squeezed her eyes shut, she couldn't bring herself to believe that the last several hours hadn't happened.

Misty couldn't move. Instead she held her grief down inside. She willed herself a few more moments of denial. A wistful minute in which she could believe that Ash was still alive.

She had seized herself up. Holding her breath in. And Misty was trying so hard not to let time move for that brief moment that when the frigid surface of the soda can gently brushed her face, she nearly bolted straight out of the hospital bed.

"Ha," Ash chuckled. "I knew you were awake."

Misty stared at him. Wreathed in the yellow fluorescent light, he didn't look real. His smile was heart breakingly familiar. Ash set the soda cans on the bedside table, scooting the uncomfortable hospital chair closer.

"Hey don't worry," Ash said, misinterpreting the emotion on her face. "Your sister's are safe. They weren't even in the gym when it exploded. Out shopping, I think they said. They're just worried sick about you- And many of the pokemon were rescued-"

She reached out for him, touching the side of his face and bringing his nervous ramble to a stop. A brilliant blush rose to his cheeks.

"Misty?"

And then she sucker punched him in the gut.

"Ah! Misty!" Ash coughed, gripping his injured side. "I haven't healed yet!"

"That's for not listening to me!"

"You didn't have to hit me!"

"Yes, I did." She leaned over the bars of the bed, and pulled his face towards her own. "This too," she said, and she kissed him. The kiss warmed every part of her body. And when he leaned in and kissed back, Misty couldn't hold back her tears. They broke apart awkwardly, Misty burying her face into his shoulder.

"I didn't think I was that bad of a kisser."

"You're not, dummy," Misty wiped away the tears, giving him a playful smack. "I've just… been waiting a long time for… that. And I had to nearly die for it."

"Sorry," Ash said softly.

"Don't apologize," Misty laughed. "Just kiss me again."

"Hold on," He laughed too, "Give me a second."

Misty grabbed his shirt and pulled him in. "One," She whispered.

And with a smile, he kissed her. At last.

* * *

The End  
Please Read & Review!

I actually wrote this story years ago but lost the word document. I just found it again and thought it was a shame that I never shared it. Especially since I owed it as a prize to missmybcmiyuki.

Better late than never, I guess.

If you would like to check out the original doujinshi that this story is based off of, you can check it out on her deviantART page under the pokecomic tab in her gallery. I would link it here if would allow links. All else fails, you can go to my deviantART page: OneWingedMuse and click the link I'll provide in the copy of Hold On I post there.

Thanks as always guys. Please leave a review if you enjoyed it!


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